2011 Shop Hop Carnival of Charms

Our Shop Hop is coming! 3/11- 3/13. The shops that are participating are:

• Quilt Basket
• Pinwheels
• The Quilt Shop
• Quilter's Corner
• Fabric Tree

All the shops will be open Friday 3/11: 9:30-7; Saturday 3/12 9:30-5; Sunday 3/13 12-4
The more you participate the more charms you collect!

Alison Newman, author of Thread & Bobbin, will be here Saturday from 11-1, signing her new book and chatting with fans.

There will be lots of Carnival fun so be sure to mark your calendars. At each store you visit, you will have the opportunity to earn charm squares. There will be games, demos, and as always, lots of fun!

Finishing Up Romance

Cathy's last tip for the Rose of Remembrance kit is working with the curves of the flowers.

Use the same same stitch and weight as when doing the leaves. We used Aurifil 40 weight thread that was specifically chosen to match the Island Batik fabrics. It comes with 12 different color threads and a portion of the profits goes to support Alzheimer's Art Quilt Initiative.

Next week Cathy is going to start a Home Dec project.

Back to Rose of Sharon Tips

As women and moms we are all about the multi-tasking. This comes in handy for the embroidery on this quilt.

I suggest working on more than one block at a time. It saves time changing thread and bobbins. I match the top thread and bobbin thread. You can do all of one color on 3 blocks before taking time to change threads.

You only need a scissors width between tracings.

One of my favorite notions has become the Rose of Sharon stencils. They are so easy to place on fusible web and trace. I tried tracing from the book and found it not as accurate.

There are many new light weight fusible webs available. We have been using Shades Softfuse and like it very much.

One last tip for the week. When stitching around the leaves,
stitches are angled EXCEPT at the tips, that is a straight line.

Ty Pennington is in the House!

I know we have been focusing on tips for doing the Rose of Sharon, but Ty Pennington's fabric has arrived and we are so excited! We will return to our regularly scheduled blog next week.

Sue has been making great use of the snow storms and coming up with clever home dec ideas for Ty's fabric. So far she has made a window shade and quilt. Drapes are being stitched as we speak.

We have gotten his line on our site and it is available to ship right now! We have all seen what a great job Ty does with other people's houses - why not bring him into your home and see what you can create?

Not to be left our Allan wants to mention the Handi Quilter Sweet Deal for February.

Buy an HQ Sweet Sixteen sit-down quilting machine and get a FREE! GO! Baby* Fabric Cutter starter set.
The GO! Baby Mix & Match Starter Set includes:
GO! Baby Fabric Cutter
GO! Square-3 1/2” (3” nished)
GO! Triangle-4 7/8” (2 - 6”W x 3”H nished geese section)
GO! Half Square-3” Finished Triangle
GO! Square-4 3/4” (use on point)
GO! Parallelogram-3 3/4” x 3 1/2”
GO! Rectangle-3 1/2” x 6 1/2” (3” x 6” nished)
GO! Cutting Mat-6” x 12”
GO! Cutting Mat-5” x 10”
Mix & Match Quilts with the AccuQuilt GO! Project Book

Retail Value: $326.87

Orders placed between February 4 and March 7, 2011 are eligible for this offer and cannot be combined with any other discounts. Must ship by March 28, 2011.

Rose of Sharon Tip #2

Cathy has lost her mind over Janome's Applique foot. The circles in Rose of Sharon get pretty small and through trial and error, Cathy got the best results with the Janome foot.

Cathy uses Janome Horizon machine with length and wide set to 2. The foot fits on any Janome machine.

 

A few of the different circles used in this 

quilt.

 

 

The foot used.

The foot in use. It makes stitching around circles a breeze!

Rose of Sharon Tips By Cathy

Tip #1 - making a curved stem.

This quilt uses both straight and curved stems. When making a curved stem as Cathy is in this demonstration, cut the fabric on a 45 degree angle. When making a straight stem, cut the fabric on the straight.

ALWAYS work on the wrong side of the fabric.

Cut your fabric on a 45 degree angle.

Remove the triangle and working on the remaining fabric, put your ruler a 1/4 inch in. Score it with your Hera.


Now move the ruler in to a 1/2 inch and score again. Move the ruler to 3/4 inch and cut.

Your strip will have 2 score marks, fold the right side into the middle, iron and then fold the left side into the middle and iron.

You will have a 1/4 inch bias strip.







To keep the strip together, we used Roxanne Glue Baste It. Cathy put a few drops along the outer fold of the strip and using her fingers, pressed it closed.

You now have a perfect strip for a curved stem.

Next week - applique using a circle foot!

The Romance Continues

Not between us and old man winter, but with Marti Michells The Romance Continues. We are offering it as a Block of the Month and as a kit. You can choose from Navy or White. Cathy has started working on a few blocks: